Quantifying inequalities in the global employment landscape during the low-carbon transition

Just transition is a central issue on the COP30 agenda. However, the impacts the energy transition has on the labor market, particularly its cross-country heterogeneity and economy-wide, multi-sectoral effects, remain insufficiently quantified. Here, we use the E3ME-FTT model to assess the spatial and temporal patterns of global employment shift during the transition. We find a net increase of 14.59 million jobs globally by 2050, representing a 0.4% increase, primarily driven by clean energy expansion. Job losses in fossil fuel extraction amount to 15.89 million and fall disproportionately on lower-skilled workers. New roles demand significantly higher average skill levels than those being displaced. At a skill similarity threshold of 0.95, up to 83.6% (5.1 million) of workers face reemployment barriers. Regionally, fossil-fuel-dependent and low-income economies exhibit higher employment sensitivity to the low-carbon transition. These findings reveal structural bottlenecks in labor reallocation, underscoring the need for targeted policies to address skill mismatches and regional disparities.